


grow up, grow out

by cherriedpeaches



Series: Arumika Week 2019 [3]
Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Arumika Week, Can be viewed as Platonic, Canon Compliant, F/M, Fluff, Haircuts, Set During The Time-skip
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-25
Updated: 2019-09-25
Packaged: 2020-10-28 06:34:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,964
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20774123
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cherriedpeaches/pseuds/cherriedpeaches
Summary: “You want me to shave your head?”Armin jumped, letting out a nervous laugh. “No! I just meant, like, short-short. Boyish short. Please don't turn me into Connie.”...Arumika Week, Day 3: Hair





	grow up, grow out

Armin hadn't changed his haircut in over a decade.

It's not like his hair had stayed the exact same since he was seven years old. It's hard to find the same person to cut your hair every time. Especially when you're forced to flee your hometown at ten years old, and proceed to join the army at fifteen.

Needless to say, Armin had been cutting his own hair in the mirror for quite some time.

This worked out... surprisingly well, after a while.

Of course, when he had first started doing it, eleven and just after losing his grandfather to the reclamation missions, it had been a mess. 

He'd been using a blunt pocket knife (the one that Eren had insisted on getting for protection, as if two and a half inches of dull metal would save them from a ten-meter titan. And Armin knew that the knife wasn't for humans. Eren never thought of anything but titans, in those days) that didn't slice cleanly through his hair, leaving ragged edges and split ends. He had cut the back shorter than the front, giving the entire hairstyle an odd, tilted downward look, and he'd cut his bangs comically short. His hand was covered in nicks from the blunt blade.

It didn't help that he didn't even have a mirror.

Mikasa had found him at the edge of the river, gazing sadly down at his own warped reflection, clutching their tiny penknife and suddenly (or not so suddenly) missing his grandfather so keenly that it made him physically ill.

She'd gently pried the knife out of his hand, with ease (despite the fact that Armin had been holding it so tightly that his fingernails left indents in his skin; he didn't know if that said more about Mikasa's strength or his own), and knelt beside him.

“I can finish cutting it for you, if you want,” she'd told him quietly, only barely louder than the lazy trickle of the river beside them.

A part of Armin had wanted to resist. He already felt far too dependent on Mikasa and Eren, he always had, and this was supposed to be something he did entirely on his own.

But Mikasa didn't look at him with pity, or sadness, or anything else that would have made Armin want to throw himself into the river. All she did was look at him expectantly, the way that you do when you extend a piece of bread to someone and are waiting for them to take it.

And, well, Armin's hair really did look terrible.

So Mikasa cut his hair. She'd made quick work of it; evening out the front and back, nipping away broken ends, flicking the fallen locks off his shoulders. She sat back on her heels and looked at him.

“I'm done now,” she'd said, pressing the handle of the knife back into his palm. Armin had nodded and peered into the river.

It had taken a second to discern, given the movement of the water and the fact that the light source came from behind his head, but he looked... better, was the best word for it. Mikasa had cut the front of his hair to level the back, though his hair was shorter than he usually cut it, just reaching past the tips of his earlobes. There was nothing to be done about his bangs, he'd just have to wait for them to grow in.

Mikasa was pretty capable as a barber.

That's why, over half a decade later, Armin asked Mikasa to cut his hair again.

Armin had cut his hair shorter than usual before. He'd considered cutting his hair before joining the Survey Corps, as Mikasa had. The week before the set expedition to the ocean (the  _ ocean!) _ he'd cut his hair chin-length and he'd  _ liked _ it. So every time he cut his hair from then on, he'd cut it just a little shorter, a centimetre or two, until, well...

“Could you cut it all off?”

Mikasa looked at him, surprised. She'd agreed to cut his hair with a shrug, picking up a pair of scissors. They had situated themselves outside, near the grass, where Levi was less likely to find and brutalize them for getting hair everywhere. “You want me to shave your head?”

Armin jumped, letting out a nervous laugh. “No! I just meant, like, short-short. Boyish short. Please don't turn me into Connie.”

“I wasn't going to,” she huffed, lowering the scissors. “If I were to shave your head, it would be shaved  _ cleanly.” _

“You would've turned me into an egg? You would've turned me into  _ Pixis?” _

“Hush,” Mikasa said, shuffling on her knees. Armin sat on a lower stone step in front of her, facing the grass. “Stay still unless you wanna get stabbed.”

“Somehow I doubt that you're clumsy enough to shiv me with a pair of scissors,”

“I never said accidentally,” And with that comforting sentiment, Mikasa took the first lock of hair and gently began snipping away at it.

Slowly, one by one, Armin could feel soft clumps of blond hair brushing past his ears and neck as they fluttered to the ground.

Mikasa would pick up a lock, snip it carefully, then let it fall back against his head as she checked the evenness.

Mikasa gently ruffled a hand through his half-cut hair, shaking out the loose hairs. Armin's eyelids fluttered. It was nearing noon, the sun reaching its highest point in the sky and throwing patterned sunlight through the branches of the trees nearby. Armin and Mikasa remained just out of the glare, in the shade of the stone steps of the base, but they could still feel the sun heating up the earth in front of them.

The odd, spongy sound of scissors cutting through hair slowed a little as Mikasa sat back, trying to see anywhere that needed to be neatened up. A couple more snips, here, there the back of his head, just in front of his ear, and Mikasa proclaimed, “I'm done.”

Armin shook his head a little, feeling some of the cut chunks of hair falling off his shoulders and onto the ground. He ran a hand through his hair, the rest of it feeling like it had disappeared under his fingers. “Whoa,” he muttered.

Mikasa silently passed him a cracked, oval handheld mirror (well, not so much  _ handheld _ as just small enough to be carried around) and Armin peered at his own reflection.

Despite the boyishness of his haircut (he wasn't quite ready for an undercut, á la fifteen-year-old-Jean) and the fact that his face still retained some roundness from childhood, he looked almost older.

Or maybe not. Looking into the mirror made him  _ feel _ older. He still looked young for his age (he had a lot of growing to do in that regard) with the whole big-eyed button-nosed look. But for a long, long time, he had looked into the mirror and seen the same kid who had frozen up the first time he had seen a titan, who came last in training every time, who couldn't fight back when the government all but murdered his grandfather, who couldn't bring himself to chase after Eren and Mikasa, who relied on his friends, time and time again, to defend him from bullies.

And Armin was a lot of things, nowadays. But he hadn't felt like that little kid in a long, long time.

He ran a hand through his hair again, still looking in the mirror. He wondered about the people, the endless neighbors and workers from Shiganshina, who had looked at him with pity and sadness and vague distaste. He wondered if they would recognize him today.

Armin set down the mirror and smiled at Mikasa.

The corners of her lips twitched a tiny bit, giving him her own smile in return. Mikasa's eyes flickered back up to his hair for a second, looking thoughtful. Armin was about to ask her what was going through her head, when she opened her mouth and said,

“Could you cut my hair, too?”

Armin blinked, setting down the mirror. “Sure,” he said, getting up and stretching his legs. “How do you want me to cut it?”

“Like yours,” Mikasa scooted forward, sitting on the step where Armin had been.

Armin stopped his shuffling for a moment staring at her for a second. “You sure? That's a lot of hair…”

Mikasa tilted her head, but didn't glance back. “I'm sure,” she said, voice even. “I've been meaning to cut my hair for a while,”

Armin knelt behind her, picking up the scissors. He knew that before they officially joined the military training program (by Sina, that felt like a long time ago) Mikasa had cut her hair shorter than usual, the tips reaching midway between her jaw and shoulders. She'd seemed a lot more comfortable, after that. Probably easier to move without the layers of hair blanketing her shoulders.

Armin wondered if this was for the same reason, or something more. “Okay,”

As Mikasa had before him, Armin picked up the first strand of long, dark hair, and began snipping.

* * *

Cutting Mikasa's hair took longer than her cutting Armin's hair. Mikasa's hair was longer, and far thicker. He'd finish cutting one strand of hair, being sure to keep it even and the ends from splitting, and he'd look again and see  _ more _ hair underneath it.

Armin had been cutting his own hair for a good few years, but he wasn't used to this  _ much _ of it.

Darker, denser locks of hair floated downward and mingled with the golden ones already there. They really had to hope that it would get really windy, really quickly (unlikely, considering the way the midday sun shone) or Levi might find this mess and beat them with a broom.

Armin gently brushed off some of the hair on Mikasa's shoulders, when it began to build up and look irritating. Somehow, she remained still as the stone steps that they were perched on.

Armin snipped away roughly 75 percent of Mikasa's hair, then sat back on his heels and handed her the mirror.

And as she looked into it, her lips twitched again, a small and subtle smile, and Armin relaxed.

Despite the fact that her shorter hair exposed her ears, jaw, and neck, Mikasa looked... less vulnerable. The scar on her cheekbone stood out more easily, no longer shadowed or hidden, giving her a battle-hardened look.

The shorter hair did the same for her as it did for Armin. She didn't look exactly like the girl who ran around with him and Eren anymore. She also didn't, necessarily, look like the ruthless soldier that so many either saw her as or wanted her to be. She just looked more Mikasa, more herself.

More importantly, she seemed pretty happy about the mobility upgrade. Mikasa kept tilted her head from side to side, surprised and thankful for the lack of the hair that had been blocking her way before.

“It's nice,” she said, and ran a hand through her hair. “Thank you.”

Armin smiled, again. “No problem,” A pause. “Do you think that we should get out of here before Levi finds all this hair?”

“Definitely,” Mikasa brushed the remaining fluffy chunks off her shoulder.

“What do you think the others will say when they see our matching haircuts?”

(They weren't quite matching. Mikasa's hair was more layered, due to the thickness, and longer in the front. Still, it was the thought that counted.)

“Doesn't matter. We should act like there's nothing different,”

“Sina, you're an evil genius,”

And off they went, arm in arm, walking a little faster when they began to hear the familiar swearing of the Captain behind them.

It really was lovely outside, that day.

**Author's Note:**

> i mean, we all know they cut each other's hair, right? right?
> 
> that scene where armin cuts his own hair terribly is based on a mashup of memories i'm sure everyone has experienced at some point. one where i cut my own hair at like 5 and messed it up real bad, one where my SISTER cut her own hair at like 4, and one where my dad cut my hair and accidentally gave me terf bangs. good times
> 
> my tumblr is @brightwritesstuff !


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